March ~ Hello!

 

Welcome March. The Mud Month. The ugly brown month.
The opposite of November Ugly month.

Already tired of the colors of brown mud and now dirty snow, I decided to brighten up the one part of the house I can change up often. Don't laugh too hard. The above is what I had designed and ordered for a shower curtain and squishy bath mat.

I'd made a photo of a stream years ago into a shower curtain that was really quite expensive to do. I decided afterwards to just purchase ones on line. I have a winter one, a fall one, and my stream one. I wanted something bright and cheery to walk by. 

These are May photos from last year. The rug is from my east garden while the bleeding hearts were blossoming. The wild geranium is on the edge of the summer pasture. I went out on a dewy spring morning with low fog and found this beauty.

My house is so tiny that this is like a huge artistic pallet. You can see this from the porch door. Don't laugh, we DO close the door when using the bathroom. But I do like it. Very cheery. 

I was very surprised at the quality. I ordered it through Walmart and it came in 5 days!

On another note. The first day of March was bone chilling cold. It never got above freezing and I should have worn YakTraks or snowshoes to hike the valley in. Thank goodness I had on my Muck Boots. I walked right in the creek and enjoyed seeing the last of the icicles hanging off from branches just above the creek.

Mr. Charlie was having an easy time of it. He walked right across the crusted snow. I was wishing I was Charlie.

We found the deer that we'd seen a month ago. The birds and other members of the clean up crew had left just bones. Nature has a way of cleaning up after herself.

I made it to the 'campground' as it was once dubbed. The Peterson family used to all camp out in this area along with the mix of cattle that ran the land. They generally all camped during the summer holidays, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, and Labor Day. Kids ran around and swam in the creek. Fireworks were set off and they had great cookouts and parties. 

They've all grown up and no one comes anymore except the 4 wheelers and the UTV's.

There I am on one of the banks watching Charlie.
I called and we headed home carefully. It took me twice as long to get home than normal. Stupid me for not wearing the proper foot gear!

Imagine trying to follow all of my previous boot prints. This week's high temps will melt the rest of the snow. It should be an interesting week to watch the changes in the valley.

As the snow melts, moss, lichen, and bones will show up. I smile in anticipation.

Mushy Mushy & funny signs

With temps rising into the 40's I knew that the snowshoes would collect snow pack as I walked. Lucky me, however as the guys with the 4 wheelers had been out tearing things up on the neighbor's land. See the oldest brother says it is trespassing and gets upset. The oldest brother lives 4 hours away. The younger brother that lives there lets his work pals [some who are of dubious character] take their UTV's and 4 wheelers out and rip up trails.

The local law says if one brother says they can be there, it is not trespassing. I've talked with the UTV dudes and they know I am out there most of the time. We've run into each other a few times. [Only because I allow them to see me.] 

We talked on Sunday while I was out walking Charlie. I was happy they worked up the trails in the woods. Charlie and I could walk in packed down snow.

Charlie was ecstatic. He ran like the dickens up and down the slippery mushy trail. We hadn't been on a long hike since the cold spell. I walked along trying to ID trees and just watching out for coyotes. 

When we finally got down to the creek and valley, Charlie took off like a bullet and charged through the creek and scrambled up the opposite bank. He was chasing a turkey. 

Tiny dog on top of the stream bank. One of the places where the 4 wheelers have damaged the soft bank of the stream. I'm the shadow. Charlie spent a long time watching the turkey as it flew across the valley.

We headed upstream back to our land. The going was easy along the creek and got harder once we headed up my old snowshoe trail which was pure mush now. 
Step, slide, step, stumble, 
it was like an incredible work out. CrossFit had nothing on deep mushy snow! Balance and leg strength!

I thought we'd have it easy peasy when I reached the summer meadow. Alas. Not so.

Poor Charlie. Being a Low Rider presents issues in deep snow. But he went snow swimming.

He was still hunting turkeys. He'd pause every once in a while and scan the trees. Or perhaps it was squirrels he was watching for.

He was dragging butt by the time we got home. And I was tired of walking like a drunken sailor. 

I'd taken my little red pocket camera and for some reason I'd bumped the tiny switch on it to log my gps coordinates. I never do that . However, it was interesting to find out that the elevation change from the creek at the muddy bank to the house was 323 feet in elevation change. 

Lastly. I got bored and decided to order a couple of signs of my own.  Back by our fence line where the not so nice absentee landowner put up his signs. He also has a deer stand setup to shoot on my property. I will re-string the barbed wire and have a few more tricks up my sleeve to make deer hunting awful that little section.

One should not piss off an 'old' lady who has nothing better to do than think of creative ways to subtly get back.

And yes, I do carry a pistol.
And no, I never intend to hurt anyone. This person invites friends to hunt and they set up their stands to shoot on other's land. The whole group is disliked intensely by our ridge community as they 'think' they can do what they want. This land is really quite remote so I bet they think I wouldn't notice their stand OR their arrows on my land.

Today? I'm going hunting some ice caves on KVR. 

March is Warming & Snow Melt Month

Well, we also fondly call it the Mud-Month.  When the snow melts and the sun shines, the frost comes out of the ground and makes our gravel roads mushy and squishy and ... in some spots, sink holes of mud.

At night it freezes into ruts.

And the process begins again the very next day.

This morning I took a quick trip down to the creek with Morris.  We'd gone late yesterday afternoon, but the run off hadn't begun by 5pm.  

Although the pastures had water running off from them.

 

I knew it wouldn't then, too many places where the water should run were clogged with ice and snow yet.  The woods was still knee deep in the white stuff.

The view above is from this morning's walk.  You can see the land.  Where the X is, is right above the creek.  You can see that the land is steep so it will take a lot to get the water running in the spot.

Being able to be present during the first 'run off' is pretty neat.  I hope to catch it this year as I have in years past.

It takes a lot of watching and guess work, but mostly luck to catch the first melt and flash flood.

I was able to take a photo this morning of the little falls that had started my 'Creek Project' back in November.

Today it looked like this:

And here was the same spot on November 6th:

Well, the weather people said it would be warm and windy today.  But the sun has gone behind clouds and the March winds are howling.

If it stays this overcast, the melt will hold off yet another few days.
Which would make me happy as I work for the next couple of days which are supposed to be rather cold.

Happy March Winds and Snow Melt!